War Horse
by quillandspindle
Summary: "Then, because he was lord of tricks and bitter satire, he named it Kraven - not for the color of its heart but for the fear it would instill in their enemies." A story of exile, irony and an imaginary friend.
1. Part 1: BEFORE

A/N: **A four-parter! Can I first tell you how all this started? I've had the absolute delight of being in the company of a little girl with a BFF stuffed toy which she's brought to life in her imagination. Probably you've all known kids like that, who've created an entire world in which their comfort animal is the star, right? It's so wonderful to watch, and to look at the world through the eyes of a child. Which made me remember one of my favorite comics - Calvin and Hobbes. Who doesn't love Hobbes? And who hasn't felt their heart break, reading between the lines of Calvin's dialog with Hobbes? It is at once charming and poignantly sad, simultaneously a celebration of childhood (and its unparalleled creativity) and the impending loss of innocence.**

 **Calvin reminds me in so many ways of Puck, one of which is his love-hate relationship with his schoolmate and neighbor Susie. It's like Puckabrina for preschoolers! If you haven't read Calvin and Hobbes, I gently recommend it to you - it's so funny and sweet. And wrenching.**

 **Anyway, it all made me want to write a(nother) story of Puck, whose entire existence in the books is about Leaving Things Behind - his childhood, his carefree responsibility-less life, his family, his prejudices, his roguish defences, his fears . . . We first meet him in Book 1 as an exiled boy-prince, with a fantastic backstory that would have Flynn Ryder's eating his dust, but which we only find out about 3 books later. This is my take* on those years before, and after, and of the imaginary friend who kept him from falling apart.**

 *** The take is mine, but the actors are Buckley's.**

* * *

The banishment had been instantaneous.

Or, at least, it had seemed that way. It was hard to place all the details - one minute he was the crown prince of Faerie, strutting about the halls of the palace; the next, he was alone in the twilight of Central Park, surrounded by shadows, a nobody.

He'd had a vague recollection of his mother rising from her chair, a protest dying on her lips as she'd lowered her eyes in acquiescence to his father's authority. His brother - co-conspirator and fellow battle-strategist - had been outside in the corridor, still gathering the small nursery toys they'd been using to stage an epic war.

The war he'd been about to win by sending his intrepid knight into the fortress to save the princess.

Before his father had walked right through the battleground on his way to the throne room, scattering game pieces left and right in his impatience and disregard.

The Crown Prince had shouted out in indignation, a small war horse in his fist, devastated that the past hour of careful scheming had come to naught.

The King had turned and called him a child for playing with toys. _It was no wonder_ , he'd said, disappointment percolating beneath his sneer, _that his kingdom was in ruins_.

The Crown Prince hadn't missed the double meaning in his words. After all, he'd heard it so many times, phrased in so many ways, so as to keep the wound fresh with each cruel thrust. He'd told himself it was what fathers said to sons to turn them into men. He'd tried to let it be noise in the background, had tried to let it drift harmlessly away, but it had nonetheless lodged itself in the tender places of his soul.

 _You are a child._

And he'd believed it, swallowing it like a bitter pill, defenseless as it hardened him from the inside out, until his body itself had surrendered the will to change, to become something more, to prove his father wrong.

No longer.

His brother, sensing the storm, had laid a warning hand on his arm -

\- too late.

The heir to the throne of Faerie straightened from his crouch and challenged the King. _I am not a child._

 _Then prove it_. The King had faced him, disdainful. _Marry the princess and be a man._

He'd clenched his jaw; it made no sense, his father's command. There was no connection between the two; it was not even an alliance between kingdoms, not if the princess was really only the Queen's own handmaid. The betrothal had been a farce from the beginning, and he'd even felt sorry for the girl who'd stared longingly at him from his mother's side, so buoyed by fantasies of glory and intimacy that she hadn't realized he'd never let it happen. Because he'd known - everyone had - that it was merely his father's whim to belittle him, to imply that he had nothing to contribute, a way to prove that either by accepting or refusing, he was still only - and _exactly_ \- a child.

 _No_.

On the ground behind him, his brother had stifled a gasp.

Father and son had then entered the room where the Queen waited, the courtiers standing at attention.

Before the court, without even a sidelong glance, the King had turned his dare into an ultimatum.

 _Marry the princess or be banished._

The boy had stood his ground, battling the will of his father.

 _Never. I will never choose the princess to gain a kingdom._

The King's face had borne no expression.

 _You_ are _a child. But you are not my son._

Yet another permutation of his shame and utter unworthiness, the words had nonetheless ripped him apart. And he'd lost both the battle and the war.

* * *

For hours, he wandered aimlessly down the paths of the park, an immortal boy in a human landscape, with nowhere to go. Fueled by shock and anger, he kept walking, trying to get as far away as possible from the trod that joined this world to his. But close to midnight, he collapsed against one of the granite formations, huddled away from the streetlight. He'd taken nothing from the palace - no food, no clothes, not even a farewell, so quickly had the soldiers carried out his father's sentence.

Not _quite_ nothing. There was something in his hand, an artifact from the surreal moments before his life fell apart.

He relaxed his fist, uncurling his fingers -

\- the war horse.

No, not a horse. It was a unicorn, made of fabric and meticulously hand-stitched. He remembered now - his knight had been gifted it by the wise sage in the cave, to storm through the ranks of demons and ogres and save the princess. He would've delivered her to her father unharmed, and the Demon Lord, bereft of its hostage bride, would have relinquished its hold on the realm. He would have saved the kingdom. He would have been a hero.

And he would not have asked for her hand in marriage, nor taken it had it been offered.

He imploded.

Around him, unseen eyes beheld his grief.

* * *

When dawn spread golden fingers over the horizon, he made himself get up and move on. The humans would soon come in droves and there was no longer the darkness to shelter him. He'd been alive for centuries and he knew, had witnessed firsthand, what they would do to his kind. He still had his magic and his power, but what good were they among fools who could not see him for what he was, let alone cower before him?

He remembered his mother's gift to him the day she had crowned him king. Cut down once again by his father's words, he'd come to her, shattered, and she'd mended him with promises of justice and - one day, when his father would not be expecting it - the throne. Until then, she'd murmured as she'd held him, he would be the emperor of mischief, the ruler of an empire of his own choosing.

So he'd grown into his name, going from realm to realm and leaving his mark wherever he deigned to dupe the unsuspecting and dally with the innocent. And as he'd returned, triumphant, to his court, he'd basked in the homage they'd paid him: _Hail,Trickster King_.

But _this - this_ was _their_ world; _they_ were the kings here, not he.

He gazed down at his clothes, resplendent in the brightening daylight, a mockery of who he no longer was. Bitter and afraid, he threw himself into a pool of mud underfoot to hide their opulence; he was of earth now, common and fragile, and he did not want to remember, did not want them to see.

For three days he lived in the park, tucked away in trees and hollows, watching the mortal world go by while time stood still in his. With one hand, he stole food from the carts and picnic blankets, blinking at the precious babies and the beloved children nestled in the arms of their parents who, by simply _being_ , cut him.

With the other, he held fast to the unicorn - the only thing he could call _his_ \- and hid.

* * *

After a month, the dryads found him.

Weak from hunger and the constant vigilance of the hunted, he'd been curled up in a hole in the ground when they'd emerged from the shadows and clustered around his body, whispering to each other in the sibilant rustle of leaves.

 _We daren't come earlier_ , they said. _We would've sheltered you, but we were afraid of the King_.

Even exiled, his father was still taking away from him.

In a murmur, he told them to let him die. No one would care, he assured them, because he belonged to no one. And because he had nothing.

Their voices grew agitated as they conferred.

He must leave, the oldest among them finally announced. He must go where he would no longer be in his father's shadow, haunted by the specters of his past. They told him the name of a place where he could be safe, where there were others like him, where he wouldn't be alone.

But there was a barrier, they warned him, an ancient stronghold. Once he'd entered, he could never leave, could never come back.

After they'd departed, leaving behind an offering of roots and berries, he stared out into the darkness, balanced on the scales of delusion and despair.

He let another week go by before he felt hope.

And yet another before he found strength.

He looked at the unicorn in his hand.

 _We have nothing to come back to, my trusty steed. Shall we then take this adventure set before us?_


	2. Part 2: THEN

They found the sanctuary, the boy and his war horse.

Even before he saw the town - a mere dot on the map of teeming humanity - he sensed the magic. It emanated from the people and creatures of power that lived within its boundaries, and his spirit was lifted by the promise of kindred souls among them. He contemplated announcing himself with his usual pomp and bravado, but it was evening when he arrived, weary from flying, and the streets were empty.

At the edge of the town, he hesitated.

He was about to choose a prison of a different kind, one that did not discriminate between royalty and commoner, only the magic that flowed in their veins. This - this small village in the heart of obscurity - would be his forever, his hell. He laughed then - a bitter sneer - understanding that no one cared to stop him, that there was no just-in-time counteroffer, that his next step would change no one's life, not even his own.

It hit him then - how alone he truly was.

He squeezed his fist around the unicorn and walked through the barrier.

* * *

He had no name in this haven.

From day to day, he drifted, marking time only by the turning of the seasons and the transient niches he called home. He did best living wild in the trees and shadows, for he was a creature of the greenwood, familiar with the spirits of nature and all growing things. His magic kept him safe and protected from the elements, but his hunger possessed him and made him vulnerable and needy. When the earth was warm and alive, he found food in the ground and between the leaves, but in the colder months, he would emerge from hiding and forage in the places where people lived: a kitchen window, a vegetable garden, a farm, a dumpster. In the beginning, he felt sick at the irony - a prince and heir to a kingdom, stealing scraps and hunting vermin - but his will to survive changed him, drove him to choose and want things he would never have imagined when he'd lived in luxury and excess. He stayed in one place for as long as it sustained him, careful for his pilfering to be blamed on foxes or other predators, and then, like a locust in a swarm leaving behind barren pickings, he moved to the next eden of plenty. In that way, he kept himself alive.

Still, all the food in the world could not fill his soul. Raised in a palace in the company of hundreds, he now could hardly bear the silence, the absence of others who, by their words and actions - no matter kind or cruel - had made him real. Now, he would live for no one, share his thoughts with no one, be missed by no one, love no one.

One morning, after a particularly successful raid on an outlying ranch, he sat in an oak tree, rubbing his full belly and gazing at the rising sun.

 _I need a fellow soldier_ , he reflected; _missions and quests and wars are not meant to be braved - or celebrated - alone_.

When he was a prince, his brother had been his wingman, his cover, the Bonnie to his Clyde. But their bond had been sundered, thanks to his father, and now he must elect another. But who?

The unicorn would have to do. It was all he had, anyway.

That, and his imagination. It was a weapon like no other; with it, a child could build fortresses, create civilizations, fill worlds.

So he touched his finger to its tiny horn, feeling the magic ignite, and the creature swelled until it was the size of a large cat.

He stared at its glass eyes and sighed.

 _You're not as big as the legend you are named for_ , he told it solemnly, _but neither am I. We will be children together, then, but braver and freer than any that have ever lived. We will no longer slay villains or rescue princesses. You are my war horse and, together, we will conquer the world_.

Then, because he was lord of tricks and bitter satire, he named it _Kraven_ \- not for the color of its heart but for the fear it would instill in their enemies. And they took an oath, with his hand on its head and its hoof on his thigh, to leave mayhem and madness in their wake.

So by day, they invented mischief, and vexed the townspeople. But at night, he slept with his arm around its neck, his body against its flank and the jeweled tip of its horn guarding his heart.

* * *

For six and a half years, he embraced the destiny his mother had laid on him.

In the seventh year of his exile, destiny intervened.

He had been living in the woods behind an old house, where there had been a veritable bounty of berries and root vegetables growing wild in the late summer sun. He feasted and frolicked, and sparred with his war horse in make-believe wars over blood and land and honor. He was careful to keep themselves hidden - sometimes they even made a game of it - but he hadn't realized whose backyard it was that he'd chosen as his battleground. The inhabitants of the house noticed the comings-and-goings among the trees and watched until they spied him.

"Who is he talking to?" The old lady wondered aloud.

"I believe. . . it is his toy horse," her companion replied.

The old lady's heart pinched inside her chest. "Jacob had a lion when he was little," she recalled fondly. "It kept him safe from monsters. And they were always going on adventures."

"Comfort objects," the old man affirmed.

"Yes," said she.

"I suppose, if he's been alone all this time . . ."

"He is just a boy, Canis."

"Indeed."

"We must help him."

"If he wants to be helped."

"He must at least _eat_."

"True."

So they hunted him down.

"Where is your family?" They asked.

"I have none."

They were the first words he'd spoken to another living being since arriving in the town. The old woman looked upon his ragged frame and saw the sons she had lost.

She held out her hand to him.

* * *

He rejected them in the beginning, thinking them old and frail and beneath him.

But they continued to tempt him with food and soft words, and he condescended to take the bread and cheese and the occasional cut of meat. And, slowly, he began to feel as if he mattered.

He wouldn't talk about his family, so she told him about hers.

He learned that she had once been a mother and a wife.

And that her husband had been killed by a monster.

 _He must have been an unskilled fool_ , he remarked.

 _He died saving his son_ , she corrected.

And he knew, right then, that she was not to be trusted.

 _You are a liar,_ he snarled, jumping to his feet and hurling away the loaf he'd been savoring only seconds earlier. _No father would_ ever _do that for a son._

Then he leaped back into the darkness, and she feared that she had lost him, just when she'd finally found him.

* * *

That night, he buried his face in the neck of his war horse and wept tears of fury at the cosmos. And he did not care that no one might have heard.

* * *

Winter was unforgiving that year.

The old woman told her companion that she needed to try to reach the boy once more. She couldn't explain it, she said, but he was important to her. So they went out with a bundle of clothes and food, and called to him from the edge of the wood.

He stood among the trees, and the old man frowned when he saw that the boy was even more ragged than before.

The old woman opened her home to him, but he would have none of it.

"Then at least visit once in a while, whenever you're hungry," she pleaded. "If not for yourself, perhaps . . . for the welfare of your war horse?"

They left the bundle on the ground, an offering to the gods of reason as much as to him.

Four days later, in the middle of a blizzard, there was a knock on the door. When she opened it, she found him standing outside, dressed in new jeans and a green sweatshirt, its hood over his shaggy head, buried in frigid white. Under his arm was a unicorn.

"I am a fairy," he informed her with dignity, "and I have lived centuries in sun and snow. I am not weakened by the cold."

"Of course not," she agreed in all seriousness.

"But my war horse needs shelter. And oats. Just for the night."

"Our invitation extends to any of your court," she assured him, as she set them both on the couch under blankets, and watched as his shivering ceased and he inhaled three meals' worth of food. Minutes later, he was asleep, curled into himself, the forsaken boy who had found his way into her house and her heart.

He had no family, he'd said.

 _Then_ , she decided, _we shall be his_.

* * *

Time was golden then.

The long nights gave birth to the happy carefree days of spring and summer, and as the trees once more came alive, the boy flourished. He watched and listened and, casting aside the elegant tongue and formal bearing of the court he'd left behind, learned the speech and demeanor of the common man. He confounded the townsfolk with his pranks and trickery, honing his skill to an art, and continued to live off the land at their expense. But they no longer met him with mistrust; they knew him now - _The One Relda Grimm Had Taken In_ \- and if any had an inkling of the circumstance that had brought him to them, they did not speak of it, nor hold it against him.

Word of his ingenuity spread near and far and earned him the attention of the pixies in the greenwood, who thought him a kindred soul in merrymaking and devilry. They gave him their allegiance, and he fashioned a sword from a tree branch and became their master. Together, they descended upon gullible humanity - the boy general and his war horse, leading a rogue army into the playing field fate had designed for its own wicked amusement. He reveled in his newfound infamy and his heart knit itself whole on the praises of his minions and the lamentations of their fallen. He found himself again, rewrote his part in the cosmos, and redefined what it meant to be free.

His father had meant to crush him under the weight of tradition and forge him into fortune's hero, but he had not been broken.

 _Behold_ , he bellowed with fierce joy, hurling his gauntlet into the vapid face of Fate, _I am a villain of the worst kind_.

Then Fate answered, and dispatched a princess to save him.

* * *

 **A/N: This story has been harder to write than I'd initially thought it'd be. I was surprised. Largely, it's because it's so different than the ones I've written so far - for one, it has so little dialogue,* which would've been an easy way to drive any plot. For another, it is a retelling of the book's course of events, and not really a new story per se. And of course, all the chapters are much shorter than my usual rubbishy-going-on-and-on-forever ones. It takes concentration to NOT write thousands and thousands of words. And I still think I wrote too much. Some day I will return and more objectively edit these chapters, and cut them down so they can say more in less. Anyway, I hope you still enjoy it as is now, and have a wonderful weekend - spring is almost upon us (in this part of the world, anyway)!**

 *** This chapter actually has the most dialogue of all four.**


	3. Part 3: NOW

From the moment he laid eyes on her, he'd known what she was.

She arrived with her sister one fall evening, estranged granddaughters delivered, captive, to the old lady and her companion. Young and beautiful, with hair the color of spun gold, she was just as broken as he, twice as abandoned, and filled with a fury that belied her desperation to survive and keep her sister safe.

 _She's just like the others -_ he surmised as he watched the handover - _hapless damsels that needed rescuing, with their hopeful eyes and fragile souls._ He'd met so many in his lifetime - faces as fair as to seize one's heart in rapture, confessing their love, vowing that they'd leave hearth and home, would give up everything to be with him.

He'd seen through it all - their obsequiousness and lofty promises. They wanted his power, his status, the idea that he could save them from themselves. They didn't want _him_ \- a boy unfit to rule, whose only charm lay in his dubious claim to a throne no one believed he deserved.

He'd washed his hands of princesses - every last one of them. And when this one came hurtling into his life, bitter as frozen rain, he swore he'd have nothing to do with her.

Even if her face was so fair that it took his breath away.

The old lady called her _liebling - sweetheart_ \- and offered her a home and an inheritance of power and magic.

 _Ah_ , he thought, _this one is luckier than most, for she is being given her heart's desire._

Instead, she turned her back on her legacy, and fought for her freedom. It gave him pause, made him _wonder_.

But when he observed her contempt for the old lady, who alone in the world had been kind to him, his heart - not entirely hardened as he'd thought - ignited. He challenged the princess with his title, his army and his sword, unaware in his outrage that, in spite of all his boasts to the contrary, he still possessed a hero's honor.

Unbeknownst to him, however, she - this enigma of a princess - had tricks of her own, and his underestimation of her cost him dearly. She defeated him, winning not only the fight but also his surprised and grudging admiration.

Then he retreated with his forces, perplexed that she was unlike any princess he'd ever known, eschewing luxury and entitlement, wanting only to reclaim the family she had lost. She intrigued him and, against his will, he was drawn to her, if only - he defended himself to Kraven - to watch her make shipwreck of her life.

 _How interesting_ , he mused, _that she does not want to be rescued, and instead aims to save others_.

He determined that therefore, she must either be extraordinarily stupid, or else unimaginably brave, and because he could not fathom the latter, he chose to believe the former.

He would discover later that he couldn't have been more wrong.

* * *

The change was so subtle, he didn't notice it in the beginning.

Heroes, he explained to Kraven, were fools. Theirs was a code of honor, with expectations and sacrifices, their reward the cloying reconciliation and riches that couldn't buy true joy.

That, he scornfully disclaimed , was not _his_ story _._ Villains lived by a better code - they sold their souls for the price of fear and submission; they lived for themselves, owing nothing, needing no one.

 _Except each other_ , he vowed anew to Kraven. _We are sworn brothers; we rise and fall together, and no one shall come between us_. But his thoughts constantly drifted to the princess - wanting to protect her, to aid her in her mission, to simply _be_ with her. He concluded that she was a threat to his villainhood, and so provoked her, as was his way, tearing her down to elevate himself in her eyes.

 _She needs to know her place;_ _she may be a princess, but_ I _am a king_.

To his consternation, she paid him no heed, so focused was she on her quest to find her parents that she was cavalier with her own safety. They were her whole world, and while he couldn't comprehend it, he felt a hollow where his heart should have been, in the shape of a family he no longer knew. So he broke his code, and helped her, trading once more in the currency of chivalry, just to see if happiness - even if not his own - could still be found within the boundaries of a home.

And when she'd failed to find them, he wrapped his wings around her broken heart, said he was sorry, and meant it.

After, he'd ricocheted, ashamed and disgusted, swearing vengeance and making oath after oath to be wilder and wickeder than before.

* * *

The kiss was his downfall.

It was not his first, technically. After all, a prince who'd been alive for centuries - even if every one of those years was on this side of childhood - could hardly have avoided such encounters with the eligible daughters of visiting royalty.

He'd been nursing a wounded ego in his room when the princess waltzed into his sanctuary and picked a fight. Her timing, he felt, had always been unfortunate, but that day, it was positively calamitous.

They argued, and the sight of her flustered and utterly immune to his natural charm, so unlike the sycophantic palace females from his past life, spurred him to close the distance between them and - as he rationalized - silence her, thus saving himself further offense. He had high expectations of the effects of his kiss on her, had fully anticipated her stunned and awed into a blushing swoon.

But he was unprepared for the way his own body betrayed _him_ in that instant, the way his breath rasped shallow, as if he were suffocating, and how his heart hammered inside his skin, like a bird trapped and desperate for release. His lips might have been those of a boy, but his soul was a crucible of things hungry and tender, brewing over the hundreds of years spent watching others love and leave him.

They stared at each other after, both lost for words, balanced on the brink of _what might be_.

Then he remembered who he was, and with those same lips made mockery of the moment and destroyed what they'd just built.

She retaliated with her fist; a thief's punishment -

\- because while the kiss wasn't his first, it had been _hers_ , and he'd had no right to claim it.

Silently lamenting his misstep and cradling his body where she'd repaid him, he turned and caught the unfocused eye of the war horse. In his distress, he imagined its look as one of spiteful amusement rather than pity, and he snapped, _What are you looking at?_ before sending it sailing across the room in an explosion of shame. She was a _princess_ \- she was supposed to play the role inscribed in time and tradition; she was _not_ supposed to rewrite the rules and make him the fool.

And yet, even in his wounded pride and righteous indignation, he could not bring himself to hate her for rejecting him. He was familiar with loss - oh, yes - but he felt something else that day - _regret_ \- and its newness derailed him, made him insecure and volatile. Later, he sought out Kraven and, without actually apologizing (for kings owe _no_ such obligation, not even to a sworn brother-in-arms), sat with his hand on its mane, puzzling over what he'd done. Without words, he poured out his heart to the noble beast and, just as stoically, the war horse understood, judging neither his thoughts nor his loyalty.

There was something else as well - a feeling he couldn't name - that unsettled him far more than the success of her defence. It lodged itself deep inside him, lit his heart like a furnace, and his body, once frozen in time, began to thaw.

On and on went their delicate dance - the Trickster King and his rogue princess in an awkward pas de deux of clumsy opposites and missed cues - he, ignorant of how to earn her favor and she, unaware of how to give it. She impressed him with her love for her family, and he impressed her by choosing to be a part of it. She was not his universe - he was not yet _that_ far fallen - but he wanted her in it, so he overturned his world, that he'd so carefully rebuilt, and made space for her. Slowly, she drew out the hero in him, the part of his psyche that believed in happily ever afters and, as heroes do, he vowed to keep her safe, even when she scoffed, _I've always been my own protector; I don't need you._

He'd disagreed, calling her the names of madness and folly, but his heart had ached at her words.

He would later realize that against his better nature, he had given her the power to hurt him.

He did not know, however, that she had done the same for him.

* * *

Others watched from the sidelines: the old lady and her companion, who saw what was growing between them, and the war horse, with its unblinking eyes, who could not.

* * *

She was with him the day his father died.

And when he became King.

And in the tremulous days in between, when he was broken from battling the monster that had threatened her life and, when he stood in the gap for her, almost taken his. She'd repaid the favor by returning him to his people, unaware that they did not want him. When she finally understood, she took his hand and stood with him in his rage and pain, and together, they watched his father's body drift from them, carried away by the river and the years the boy had lost to him. When it was out of sight, taking with it his last farewell, he turned back to the city and the throne.

He was no longer a prince. He had his kingdom now, his family, and his freedom.

She tried to be happy for him, because his exile had ended, because he was no longer alone, because he was finally home.

She let him go.

He . . . could not.

Something had shifted; suddenly the beneficiary of everything his father had long kept from him, he realized that all the wealth and power in the world meant nothing without his princess. For there, on the bank of the river, she'd held his heart and heard his soul and he'd felt, for the first time in forever, truly safe. He wanted more of it, wanted to keep her alive to ensure it, wanted to give her her family just as she had given him his.

Besides, he had a war horse to which he'd sworn an oath to return, and no true warrior would dishonor _that_.

And so, once again, he surrendered everything, and the irony did not escape him that this time, he'd chosen a princess over his kingdom.

* * *

 **A/N: Gah. A whole month between updates! This fic has been the hardest one to write so far. I'd actually written the entire story before I even posted Chapter 1, but these last two chapters were so clumsy and revolting that I procrastinated forever on the editing. So powerful was my procrastination that I even wrote another entire, brand new story, which I plan to post (heaven and chocolate helping) after War Horse is done. But I do not like unfinished stories, so I put nose to grindstone and edited it, so that I could be three-quarters finished instead of just half.**

 **This chapter has zero dialogue. It is VERY hard for me to write stories with zero dialogue. Especially chapters in which sweeping character development is occurring (one hopes) and massive changes of mind and reversals of fortune and other dramatic things are going on. The first two chapters were all about P, but this one combines P and S, and deals with all the spaces between them. So HARD without dialogue! I'm still not happy with this chapter; it doesn't feel as clean like the first two - I feel as if there are a lot of backtracking and other messy things, for instance. Someday I will probably come back and clean it up in a major way. Please feel free to review and tell me which parts grated on you, okay? I'd love to be able to fix them sooner rather than later. Thanks so much!**


	4. Part 4: AFTER

A long time ago, when he was truly as young as he looked, the boy had watched his parents love each other. He saw it in their gestures - his father's hand on his mother's arm, the way her eyes followed him as he moved in a room. He heard it in their words - the pride in his voice as he spoke her name, her placid deference to him as her lord. When they were in the presence of others, he felt it in their power, the blending of their magic as they stood before their court and commanded armies, decided the fates of nations, and spoke laws into existence. Even at his banishment - the one time his mother had faltered, and he'd felt their aura tremble - she was still one with him, united in their choice of each other over their own son.

What a paradox is love, he'd reflected as he'd been cast out, to be so strong between two people that it left no room for others, not even the ones born of it.

 _I don't know if I care much for love, if it is this;_ _it strikes me as being no different from loneliness._

* * *

When he came back to the town, he found the war horse waiting for him.

"I have returned," he announced, his speech as much like that of the world to which he'd allied himself as of the court where he'd been raised. "I see no one's decked _you_ out in roses and garlands while I was away. I hope you're up to more battles and daring rescues because it appears this princess has a death wish."

Whereupon he launched himself into his old ways, once more living off the land and bestowing a pestilence of pranks and provocation on its unlucky residents, and the war horse was his faithful companion in all. But something had changed while he'd hung between life and death, when he'd suddenly inherited the crown that used to be his father's, and just as suddenly surrendered it: he'd gone home, and found that it wasn't anymore, that he had two families now, two places to lay his head and call his own, and that his heart had grown to hold them both.

As had he.

For just as he was no longer a prince, he was also no longer a child.

The others had seen it before he realized how his body was changing. They wondered at its meaning: the boy who'd sworn to never age suddenly had, and unaware. When they told him, he exploded in rage and denial: his father - the reason for his vow to hold on to his youth - was in his past and worlds away; there was nothing to prove, no one left to defy, no need to embrace manhood, not now, not ever.

However, the old lady thought she knew: the princess was mortal, not immune to time as he was and, perhaps, he did not want her to be one more person who left him behind. In her wisdom, she kept this to herself - he would never accept the truth anyway, not when he was so angry, so afraid. When the time was right, she decided, he would see, and believe.

And it was indeed Time that opened his eyes. Drawn by magic into the future, the princess witnessed their world at war. Friends had become enemies, families had become armies, life had given way to death. Many things - things no one could have foreseen - had changed.

They had been married in that future, the princess carelessly revealed to the boy upon her return.

Something broke inside him at her words - the safe place where he was lord of his own destiny, untouched by his father's ambition. From the time he'd understood that he was fortune's stooge, he'd vowed never to wed, had believed matrimony a curse and the cause of his punishment that had cost him family and home. Fear possessed him in that moment, and he recoiled, counting as naught the months spent building their tender friendship, of learning to trust each other, of the possibility of something _more_. She had cast dark magic upon him - he convinced himself of it - she was a bitter foe now, and he would have vengeance.

 _I am betrayed_ , he cried to the unicorn, his heart twisted in shame. _And once again a princess is the cause._ _You alone - my one true ally - are trustworthy; if only you were real, we would march together into the fray and redeem our honor. Instead, you must be my muse: I will make an army of the pegasi - they are war horses like you - and deliver such retribution on the princess as the world has never seen. She will rue the day she first laid eyes on me._

So he made his heart as iron, and caused her to suffer. If he could hate her enough to hurt her, he reasoned, he could not also love her, and would certainly never wed her. In this belief, he found solace.

Until he almost _killed_ her. It was an accident, a misdirected nudge in a display of disdain that had sent her plummeting to the ground. He'd watched, tortured by the knowledge that _he_ was the cause and by the realization that if she perished, he would not forgive himself, could not live without her.

Once again, he was vanquished, his own conscience the traitor. He declared a ceasefire; what was the point, after all, of a battle that promised no glory because there were could be no victors? He saw at last what everyone had long known: that she was important, that he might even love her, inasmuch as he could understand love. Blindsided because it was unlike anything he'd seen, or heard, or felt, it filled him with terror, made him do unspeakable things. But he could not fight it, found to his surprise that he did not _want_ to, and - most terrifying of all - was driven to discover if she felt the same.

So he rekindled their friendship, teasing her and inventing such terms of endearment as vexed her heart, all to test her affection for him and remind her that he could not so easily be forgotten. And she responded in kind, blushing at his counterfeit courtship while spurning him with vituperations of her own, growing used to him even as she counseled herself: I am not of age; I have years hence to tread this path.

 _It is of no consequence_ , he agreed, _I have all the time in the world to be with her; I can wait._

* * *

Then came The War. The _real_ war, not the kind he'd so easily meted out against those around him as a shield for his own shortcomings, the grandiose gestures in his defense of a fragile heart.

It was also unlike the wars he'd fought - and oftentimes aroused - when he was still a prince of Faerie, where petty monarchs pitted court against court in bloody battles over sullied reputations and the accidental transgression of obscure laws. This was a war pre-meditated, incited by those who thought nothing of betraying blood and brother to rule the world. It was a war between men and monsters, who called on dark sorcery and spoke grandly of liberty and justice, even while they enslaved the innocent to serve their own ends.

Had he still been newly broken, he would've watched with indifference this fight for the town that stood between them and their unholy ambition, but he was no longer the same boy who'd passed through its walls to seek sanctuary from a stolen past. He was now _both_ hero and villain, and when they brought down the barrier and took the lives of the people who had become more to him than strangers to dupe for food, the boy took his wooden sword, roused his minions, and unleashed terror on the enemy. His was a fight for his town, his new family, his world.

Alongside him fought the princess, reeling from a prophecy that laid the fate of the world upon her shoulders. Desperate, she gave in to the fear in her heart, bemoaning that she was but a child, did not know how to lead an army, could not possibly win a war. The boy watched her, knowing what it was like to bear the weight of expectations, and for a moment, he thought he would comfort her. Then he hardened his resolve; she needed to be strong - he would make sure of it.

"Get up," he told her. "You are more than this. I have not thrown in my lot with yet another princess who waits to be rescued. You stormed into my life and redeemed us - your sister, your parents, your grandmother, and me. Where is that savior now? Find her, then go forth and save the world."

So she tried.

But it was a doomed battle, for although Fate ordained that she would lead it, it did not promise her return from it, and the princess was dealt a mortal wound. She would surely die, the old witch said, just as the wise old sage in the boy's imagination had long ago pronounced devastation on the realm under the reign of the Demon Lord. But this was no game between children, and his princess no gambit in their bid for freedom and victory. And while war was familiar and exhilarating to him, this one filled him with dread; the thought of losing the princess shattered him as much as the knowledge that to save her, he'd have to defy Fate itself.

And no one had ever challenged Fate and won.

 _You should've been here_ , the boy thought regretfully of his war horse as he watched her stumble, _so you might bear the princess in her pain and weakness._ _Sometimes generals choose not to lead the charge to take down the enemy; sometimes we are given the privilege of carrying something precious - if not to safety, at least to an honorable death._

So _he,_ with his magic, took the form of a war horse - a living stallion tall and strong, and bore her himself into the fray. For once, there was no speech upon his tongue - he was all too aware of the farewell between them, and he could not bring himself to speak the words.

When they arrived at the heart of the battle, the princess dismounted and strode out to meet the enemy. The boy felt his insides torn out of him, knowing he could not protect her, that this was not his move but hers - her right and duty to fulfill the prophecies spoken over her while he and the rest of the world had jeered.

He watched her - a small figure alone, defenseless against a mad army.

He watched her choose love over hate.

He watched her overcome evil and win the war -

the _princess_ , not the _hero_ , saving the world.

And he didn't know if he had ever loved her as much as in that moment.

* * *

In the ashes of the aftermath, the boy returned to the unicorn. The town was laid waste, and he was no longer a prisoner within its barrier. His life lay before him, an open door to a future in which he could do anything, go anywhere, be anyone - even King.

Someday, he thought, he would return for his throne. He'd forgiven his father, for he understood now that the weight of the world was a terrible burden to bear, and sometimes drove even the best to despair and dark places. He resolved that he would not be like his father - so afraid of losing the love of his people that he'd sacrificed his son to keep his kingdom. No, _he_ would earn the favor of his people with kindness and justice, and his court would be merry all the days of his life. And when the time came to take a queen, he would ask the princess. She would surely say yes - for had he not already been courting her all this while, and she not once _truly_ turned him away?

He marveled then, at the whim of destiny: when it was no longer forced upon him, this _curse_ \- the hand of a princess - became the one thing he'd wanted more than any other.

But they were young yet, and he wished to see the world he'd so long been denied while she stayed in hers. Their stories, after all, had scarcely begun, and even their happy ever afters were but the first step on a long journey that would take them on many adventures before their paths met again. Until then, she no longer needed him to rescue her; she was more than his equal - she had fought her own battles, and those of her people, and emerged victorious. His town - and hers, should she choose to rebuild it - was safe in her hands.

He stood now with her at the place where the barrier had once stretched between them, and told her he was leaving.

"I will come back," he vowed, "when I have shed the last traces of childhood and found my place in the world as a man and a King. If, by then, you will have me, we shall be wed."

"Don't you care that I might find other loves while you're gone?" asked she.

His laugh was the full sound of contentment.

"If we are meant to be," he smiled knowingly, "no other loves will matter, and Fate will be our witness."

Then he kissed her, sweet and yearning, a far cry from the one he'd stolen at the cost of his pride. She held him fiercely and called him cruel beauty and many other things even as her lips trembled against his.

When they drew apart, he remembered where he was, remembered that when he'd first stood there, years ago, he'd thought it was all he'd ever know, for all eternity. He remembered that he'd been a stranger and an outcast, fighting to stay alive, fighting despair, fighting an aloneness so profound that it would've taken him even before the snowfall of that first year. And he remembered his war horse, who'd fought those battles by his side and made his darkness a little less hard to bear.

But now his battles were finished, his sojourn ended. He had no need for a war horse now; he was a King; a pilgrim on a quest, the world his mecca, the princess his home.

But what of their oath?

 _One remaining fare thee well._

For the last time, he sought out Kraven, and found him lying on his side amidst the armor and swords and the other accoutrements of a soldier. Once more, he touched the unicorn's mighty horn and let his magic change his faithful companion back into a little nursery plaything. He smiled when he saw it, although his heart hurt.

"The sage who gave you to me was not that wise after all," he remarked. "You didn't help me to rescue the princess; _she_ saved _us_ instead. Well, I'm off to see the world. Sorry I can't take you this time; this is my adventure now, and there is no place in it for a war horse used to the thrill of combat. Your place is by the side of a warrior who needs you as much as I once did - someone to belong to you, someone to save. I know of one - he already has a family, but what is a boy without battles to dream of, and glory to claim? And what is a war horse without a boy to call his own?"

He left his room and found the little boy, playing on the floor with toy soldiers.

"Hey, Basil." He knelt before the princess's brother. "Look what I have. I'm taking a break from wars and this guy needs a new general. Take care of him for me, will you? And don't be fooled by his appearance- he's not a toy. His name is Kraven, and he is a war horse."

~Finis~

* * *

 **A/N: Hurrah! Finished. I thought it would never happen. Let me respond to some of the comments here, whose authors I couldn't PM back:**

 **Anon : Er. . . I might have used the word "love" in this chapter! (shields self from tomatoes) I think I know what you mean about "going back from the kiss to Oberon's death". And I agree - it's weird. And yes, the kiss threw things off (in the original books), and the Hudson River incident cemented the best parts of their friendship. If only P+S was a linear thing, it would make writing them so much more straightforward (albeit boring). But it's not, is it? It's roundabout, and part game, part dance, part journey, part stumbling in the dark. Thank you for your thoughtful comment! **

**LALALALALALALALA : Hopefully this wasn't as long a wait as the other chapter. But yes, this is the end :(**

 **Catlover360 : Thank you so much!**

 **Flirtwithmeudie : No worries about baby brothers ;) Yes, it was fun to write from P's perspective because you're right - many fics are from S's POV. I guess it's because the books are written from her POV, in a way. **

**Megslee : You're so funny. We shall talk soon! I haven't forgotten!**

 **And now, I must leave you to go edit my new story, and then I can share it with you! It will be the antithesis of this one - vast amounts of dialogue, hopefully funny - I've just been DYING to do funny after so many angsty stories - and longer. But not as long as Brink. Thank heavens.**

 **~QaS**


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